SAE Live: TuSimple and Penske Executives to Detail the Automated Freight Network Partnership

July 22, 2020

Bill Visnic

The first edition of SAE Live will feature TuSimple’s Chuck Price (left), and Penske’s Bill Combs discussing the partnership to develop the world's first Autonomous Freight Network. (SAE)

With pressures from the COVID-19 situation pressuring U.S. business and economic structures, development and deployment of high-level vehicle autonomy for the commercial-vehicle (CV) sector is accelerating as one possible relief. Shipping and delivery via fully automated vehicles is emerging as a potentially prime solution to decrease overall transportation costs while simultaneously reducing the need for close human contact in many goods-delivery scenarios. Entities across a spectrum of industries now are doubling down on efforts to bring automated shipping into mainstream service.

Two prominent transportation interests discuss the current automated-trucking environment in the first edition of SAE Live, a new-format video series developed by SAE International. Bill Combs, Vice President, Connected Vehicle Strategy and Experimentation at Penske Transportation Solutions joins Chuck Price, Chief Product Officer of automated-trucking innovator TuSimple to detail the two companies’ partnership to develop the world's first Autonomous Freight Network, what this means for the future of freight transportation – and exactly when the automated-shipping trucks will be on the road.

This initial segment of SAE Live happens in real time on July 23 at 2:00 p.m. EST (11:00 a.m. PST/1:00 p.m. CST). In this innovative new format, attendees can engage directly with speakers during the intimate 60-minute conversation. Each interactive SAE Live event includes a brief introduction of the speaker and a framing of the event topic, followed by a facilitated 50-minute audience Q&A. There also is a variety of meeting tools to enhance the experience.

“Furthering our mission to advance mobility knowledge and solutions for the benefit of humanity, we continue to look for ways to deliver timely and trusted content around the intelligence and trends in technology and mobility,” said Frank Menchaca, Chief Growth Officer at SAE International. “With SAE Live, we aim to facilitate real, two-way conversations between speakers and attendees where audiences can engage and ask questions to help aid in their professional growth.”